 Good afternoon. Welcome back to Senate Education on January 26th. We are now going to shift our attention to our career to career technical education. We know that this was a priority outlined by the governor. Also I think it's safe to say a priority of our committee to do whatever we can to not only better understand what's happening at our career technical institutions but how can we help our career technical institutions. One of the things we have heard early on is that there might be, now I'll just sort of tee this up Ms. Emerson and we can hear your testimony, there might be, we might be limiting people who can get those take career technical education. So that's one of the things we're looking at. In some ways are we limiting things? I know Senator Bullock has raised the question and the point that maybe some schools don't willingly transfer, let kids into career technical institutions. These are my sort of taking her, blame me if somebody's watching from Burlington, and not letting those dollars go as easily. But I for one, and I think everybody here really sees career technical education as incredibly important to Vermont kids no matter if this is permanent career or if they're trying to enhance their lives, you know college-ready kind of classes or just looking for for a new skill. So that's a little bit about where we're at with it and glad you could join us, and I know we have some testimony in our folder, but the floor is yours. Thank you, so I did prepare some testimony and then what you just said in my... Yeah, in my Sparkson edition. Hi, my name is Jodi Emerson. Thank you for having me here. I'm the superintendent and director of the Central Vermont Career Center School District in the Central Vermont Career Center. I started as director last year and previously I was in regular ed as an associate principal at U32 for eight years and then 14 years teaching social studies at Spalding High School. Both of them are sunny schools to me. My son is also a graduate of the Randolph Technical Career Center and I really did watch him kind of buy this time especially in middle and high school until he could get to education that was engaging for him. And unfortunately it wasn't until he was there that I realized just how much he had access to when he was there. So even though I taught at Spalding, which is right next door to my Career Center, I didn't know what kids had access to when they were there. He got over 70 certificates in the diesel program there working on peer built stuff and tons of different IRCs, so industry recognized credentials. So I learned a lot just watching my son and his experience and then reaching out and learning more about other technical centers. So I also learned in recent testimony that was given to APA who are consultants that came and did listening sessions in our state related to Act 127 that some parents feel like there is this barrier because of special education. So there's a few things that relate because Perkins funding, we have to prove that our students are getting either industry recognized credentials, they have access to them, or they have access to college credits in every single program we offer. And so for some students that could be a barrier. I know that the previous person who was talking here from CCV talked about AccuPlaser. Our students can also access CCV courses with WorkKeys, which is another assessment that act does. And we give that to all of our students. So I think it's important if they earn a five to a seven in WorkKeys, they can also access some college courses through us without taking AccuPlaser. And they get a national career writing history to get from that. So what I came here to talk about was a small pilot project that I'm actually doing with VTC right now. My emergency services instructor in collaboration with the paramedic program at VTC in Welleson took on two second year students this year. So they took emergency services last year with him. First round they did the EMT test in our certified EMTs. And this year came back to do a paramedic training. And we've been working with VTC to make that happen. There are barriers, honestly, between working with. So the first argument was who's student are they? Are they my student at the Career Center? Because we get the tuition dollars or are they VTC student at the college and get the tuition dollars there? And we were able to agree that for this trial run, last spring we talked about this. So before you got involved, actually. And we agreed that we would be able to pay for them. They would be my students, my instructor would be a co-instructor in the paramedic course because he does teach it. And that they would attend my center for three days a week and then they would go up in today's the day. So they're not here with me to help give you any information about that. They would go up to the Welleson campus and participate in that paramedic hands-on component. And then we would pay for anything above and beyond fast forward credits. Because it's dual enrollment fast forward for CTE. We get six credits per semester is allowable for a student. And these courses are 12 credits each. So we would pay the additional from the tuition we receive to VTC to allow our students to take it without having to pay any costs. So we paid for the first round. It ended up being like 7,000, a little over 7,000 for both students and we'll be paying again for this semester so that they can get that component done. So I'm kind of skipping around in that. Directly reading everything. I think what I've learned in my year and a half in CTE is that we compete with our sending schools for funds. So there is the perspective that some across the state, some of the sending schools don't send kids because they lose funding. They have to send tuition. So our tuition formula is very complicated. We can build tuition on a six semester average. So right now, for example, I have 75 spaulding kids, but based on the six semester average, I built tuition for 61 of them. And so the reason that that formula was adopted a long time ago, I think it was 2004, maybe 2007, is so that the sending schools don't have this high suddenly high tuition rate because more students got accepted into our programs and then the next year's way down. It makes you so they can really plan for and budget for because our tuition goes into their budget. What happens with our funds is we get some directly from the state. So 87% of the base rate comes to us directly for the FTEs of students we have in that six semester average. I have 204 students in my building right now. I have an FTE this year of 154. So 50 students I have in my building, I don't charge tuition for that means the tuition is a little higher because I charge it across the 154 students instead. Does that make sense? Not really. But it is the way it happens. So some of it comes directly then the remainder is built to my sending schools. So for instance my tuition next year is going to be 18,700 about and about 8,000 a little over 8,000 of that will be built to the the sending schools for the number of FTEs I supposedly have based on that six semester average. So that's how I get my funds. And then we do have some additional funding. Perkins pays me about $247,000 out of my overall $3.5 million budget just to try to get a little perspective. I have to do a ton of work for Perkins. It pays a little bit. I think that's probably true for our state college system as well. What year and year budget? This year was 3.5 it's going to be for next year because we are including academics and going full day next year. That's our plan. One thing that I also learned from my son's experience is he did the two year program at Randolph Tech for diesel and then aspired to go on to college to get diesel automotive and high performance motorsports because he wanted to be in NASCAR, honestly. And he went to the University of Northwestern Ohio because they had access to NASCAR related pieces, not because there was anything else. Really, that's what drew them. They had the race track too. The college has a race track. That drew my son. And he had the perception that VTC would be harder, that he would have to do more academic classes than he would if he went there. What he found when he got there was that, yes, he had a lot more hands on opportunities, but he had to basically repeat everything he'd done at Randolph Tech in his first year there. And then he got ahead with COVID and they went remote, which means academic courses and it didn't go well from there. He is working for NASCAR though. So he is working in the archives right now. He worked in the truck series for a little bit last year. So he did make the connections he needed to, even though he may not have had the best story. What I learned from his experience is that some of his roommates even who are in the same program and came from other states like Connecticut or West Virginia, they had attended technical high schools, regional technical high schools in their states. So they had four years of experience and they had articulation agreements that allowed them to bypass those first year classes. So they didn't get bored. They jumped right into the next level. And it's really unfortunate that our students don't have the same experience and opportunity. So how do we fix this? There are lots of ways we could. I think the pathway that we're starting with our health sciences program in conjunction with VTC and getting kids further while they're in high school is a great way to do that. I think if we had access to students sooner and we had the opportunity to have career technical high schools here in Vermont, which we don't right now, then we could provide students with more opportunities and a faster path. So while we have you on this, tell us a little bit about access to students sooner. So your son had to wait until he was he was a junior junior. Yeah. And tell us because, you know, this is I mean, we have different schools across the state. But in this particular circumstance, but I think in general, you cannot enter until you're a junior. So you cannot enter the regular programs. Okay. Most of the time unless you're a junior or senior. Occasionally, we can get permission for a sophomore to enter. We do have exploratory programs and foundational so pre tech programs. So you can take ninth and 10th graders into those programs. And if they're successful, then they can move on into other programs. There's just to kind of make it tangible what percentage of your students are 10th grade. In our regular programming, hardly any I think we have probably two, two. So I have 204 students, 24 of those are exploratory. So 180. How many of those 10th graders like or ninth graders would like to be taking more of these kinds of classes? All of them. Oh, that's right. Yeah. I mean, they appreciate the opportunity for exploratory because that that takes them to the tech center and they get to get hands on and honestly, it's a wonderful experience. If ninth graders could do exploratory and 10th graders could go into program or at least a chunk of academics and programming that directs them down that path. So I didn't I don't think I brought the proposal for the health sciences piece. But if we were ultimately to move forward with that, not just in our EMS program, but in our medical professions program, we could get kids in for exploratory as ninth grade and 10th grade, we could have a health sciences curriculum program for them. And then they could split either into the medical professions where they're getting the CCMA and the phlebotomy and then potentially nursing, starting into the nursing pathway, or they can do this EMS route where they're they're doing their emergency services and the paramedic in peace and getting through that. That would be great. Is this a legislative fix, you know, I can have which counsel? Yeah, zoom. It is a little bit. Beth is available to zoom. So it gets online, which just so okay, so it is a legislative fix. Okay, if we need to. Yeah, please. So legislative fix plus obviously the infrastructure. Yeah, if you're gonna add a third of third new students to the student, it's a quick one. Yeah, and I'm turning away under kids a year anyways, because I don't have this space in my current location. And I don't have the funds to get another space. That's a lot. Yeah, I mean, we have 294 to manage around. I was thinking that there's another barrier and I'm lost track of it. So hopefully it pops back into my head. So the other barrier for the health sciences is that we could provide co op opportunities for kids they could get out and they could work, but they can't unless they're 18 in the health sciences. And I think there's a lot of times there's a waiver for our students who are in co op to do like hazardous pieces. I don't think that's the scenario right now. I think they're just not allowed to be working in paramedicine or EMT or in hospitals until they're 18. I'm not sure if that's a legislative thing or if that's an insurance piece. That's the part that has been hard to figure out. So when we're doing this building inventory for for the state, are you all playing a role in this with in terms of Hey, it's not just about buildings that might be dilapidated, but new buildings, new spaces that we need to take sometimes for more students. Do you know if you're in that? I would love that. Okay, if I could build a new center and provide more programming for students, that would be great. I don't know how we get in conversation. Okay, so you haven't as a superintendent? No. Okay. Okay. That's something that we just don't want to lose. Yes, please. Are you attached to a traditional high school? I am attached to Spalding High School right now. We used to be part of the very unified unit school district. And we got our independence last year. So we're the fourth of the technical education center independent. Are you physically attached? We're physically attached. So I was just I'm thinking out loud, but as more students might be migrating toward technical education, I'm wondering, you know, there can be spaces opened up in the traditional school. So I'm taking a couple of those classrooms next year, I am taking a couple of classrooms from them to expand a little bit. So I can move some stuff around and add a few students or programs because our programming is limited based on whether house the safety pieces of it. So for instance, in an auto or building trades, I can only have 16 students with one teacher, I would have to add an aid to get five more students. So that's one of the barriers space is a barrier. But the classrooms within the high school are not conducive to being a shock. So we're not going to. What do I need? I need a welding program. Not going to get a welding program and one of the Spalding classrooms. I need a I need a place for that to happen a lot of space. Yeah, please. Please. This is just a follow up to that. Since we lost our tech center in Burlington, we've we've sort of I don't want to use the word farmed out, but we've collaborated with local businesses and that's we've had some like great success with that. And I'm just wondering if that's something you've explored or in your area, our newest program, Design and fabrication is in the Vermont Grand Museum. So we have explored that. I'm hoping that there's a way that we can open up something for a welding program somewhere with a partnership. We've we've explored a different kind of partnership in our plumbing program and we couldn't find a teacher for that program. And so we we took one of our subs who's a permanent sub and he's been in the classroom for consistency and then Vermont heating and ventilating has partnered with us and provided us with a master plumber who comes in now three days a week. And so we contracted with them and we pay for him to come in. But he's providing that hands on piece while my instructor who's in there every day, and it's not a licensed plumber is able to help with setting up the curriculum and carrying stuff through for the two days. It's not there. So it there's different things that get in the way and we have to be really flexible and finding flexible ways to make sure that we can partner so that kids get that access to post secondary that is required for us anyways, helps them to build pathways. They're going to stay in Vermont if they can come to us and start learning the skills meet up with a CCB or Vermont State University system, or we have we also have ties with White Mountain Community College, whatever those are, they get some experience with college, they might go on there and they might take their apprenticeship exam and like electrician or plumbing go to work for someone. So we have I know some of our students are probably going to work for Vermont heating and ventilating now. And and that's a great start to their career and they'll pay for the rest of their training on the job. Senator Williams kind of flows into the bill they had last year trying to get a contractor certified. I mean, it sounds like a fit certified to they have to be certified in order to do contact state service. Oh, you're talking about a bill? Okay. It didn't pass. Didn't pass. Um, today, just a word about your facilities in general, we'll talk to AOE to make sure all the tech centers are being incorporated into this conversation. Yes. Okay. For the record, that's your money to see education director of communications and legislative affairs. CG centers are included book at the facilities inventory, which is ongoing. And if you're hearing loud typing, I'm urgently teams named with one of the sending teams message to one of my school facilities contacts to try to it's we're in in the process right now. I don't know where where my career center is. If I find out before the end of this, I will let you know. But I they're in the process. You may not recede our reach yet. Right. And it may go to the facilities director at Spalding, because we lease the space that we have. So we have at least agreement that's that's my concern is that that's my concern too. Yeah. Yeah. Most as the committee knows, most CG centers are part of high school districts. So our school districts, excuse me. So the independent career centers are a little bit of a wrinkle there, but we'll check in and provide you an update specific. Thank you. So thank you. So I think it's important actually to know what the nature of the question is, is the nature of the question, what's the condition of the current facilities or is one of the questions potentially are you, you know, is the footprint too small to serve the student body you have or the student body you could, because you're turning away, given the limited equipment. It's just the nature of the question is very relevant. That is, and I am by no means a good resource on this. I know that the committee has started to hear some testimony on school facilities and school construction. The inventory is very comprehend that the inventory is already happened. The assessment is very comprehensive and part of it is attentive to those questions in Act 72. The thinking behind that underlies Act 72 is not only are facilities functional, workable, modern, etc, but do they also serve the learning needs of students today versus when they were built? Because many of them were built a generation ago, right? So yeah, those questions are being, and that exhausts my knowledge. Also they'll ask Ms. Emerson questions such as, hey, is the welding program what we need now in 2000, you know, is the equipment all that kind of thing, what we need in 2023? I think we benefited from some of the, we didn't necessarily get answer funds especially for an independent TTE, but we did benefit from the gear equipment from the governor. So there there were some grants that got a lot of equipment there. So most of our equipment is up to date. I mean, certainly we could probably use more. I don't have a welding program. Well, I'm thinking automotive is change, must be changing both times. Yeah, right. We have a partnership with Subaru, so we're able to get some of their training. A lot of our kids go up to the 802 group as co-op students and get trained there and stay there. So it's a good pathway. Great. Any final questions from Ms. Emerson? Before we hear from President Grail? It's very helpful. Really helpful. Yeah. You'll stick around? Yeah, thanks for having me. Great. Yeah, thank you. Mr. President, thanks for joining us. Thank you. Good to see you again. So as you know, you've heard the prompt just trying to understand our career technical institutions in high schools and certainly at BT at Vermont Tech, what's happening there and how we can be helpful around needs and resources. So the floor is yours. Thank you for the opportunity to come back. I believe we had a great conversation before about where the university will head moving forward. But today's charge is to share with you Vermont Technical College's specific programs and where we are with those and what needs we might have related to those. Vermont Technical College, as you know, is one of the best, maybe best cup secrets because it's such a France nationally very, very high, especially in return on investment. It's number one in the country. And number nine or so, number one in Vermont and number nine or so. So this is really, really good news. But that said, our tuition is still high. The way we have reduced our tuition, as you know, the basic tuition got reduced to about less than 10,000. But then these technical programs that we have at Vermont Tech and the faculty student ratio requirement from the creditors make us, you know, the cost goes higher. So we come, we charge additional fees to the students. When we reduced our basic tuition, we decided that we cut our fees for these particular programs by at least 1000 for all of them. So that's what we have already done. But still, these students that come to these technical programs are mostly Vermonters and would stay in Vermont. And if the critical scholarships and or, you know, critical occupation scholarship or other means to support these students, we could produce even more students through these these programs. Nursing and or Health Sciences is one group of programs that we piece of offers. Nursing is our biggest problem. Currently, we have 422 students this fall enrolled in three different nursing programs. Our LPN program, 182 students, ADN 143 students and RM to BSN, which is 100 percent online program for nurses that are already registered nurses taking this undergraduate program. We have 97 students. That program is growing. It's growing faster than we could add faculty. And that's one of our problems because we can't compete with nurse educators who are if they work in clinical environment, they get paid not more. And we can't pay them as much. So that's one issue that we face. We have a similar issue with our engineering programs where we can't compete with other universities and orbit industry because of the salaries that they can earn other places now. But we are doing our best. We have some limited mechanisms like a sideline agreement that we work with the unions to kind of increase the salary of the faculty that we recruit. But it is still, it is a limiting factor to get a high quality faculty member to our institution. In addition to nursing, dental hygiene, we have 65 students, radiological science, respiratory therapy, veterinary technology, and paramedicine program. These are all Vermont tech programs in the health professions arena. In engineering, we offer in fact a range of programs. The aviation professional pilot technology program is our NARTES program. And that is at the Williston campus. Then software engineering, mechanical engineering technology, electrical engineering technology. One good thing about Vermont technical college is that we offer certificate programs, we offer associate degrees, we offer highly comparative full undergraduate engineering programs. That part, we need to do a better job in marketing because those students are highly successful because we offer hands-on technology oriented training, but they get full undergraduate degrees. And the placement rate within their field is close to 100 percent. There are so many alums in different organizations, they are basically pulling our graduates before they graduate. That part is very good. I wish we can produce more, we can recruit more students and produce more. Information technology is another significant program, diesel-powered technology. Architectural engineering technology is a unique, unique program that is highly successful because all the students are getting jobs and that program nationally got recognized as a zero energy program just recently so that it's kind of carbon-neutral energy design. That is a great recognition for that program. And civil engineering, manufacturing engineering technology, electro mechanical engineering technology, these are high-end programs so we have the facilities having added our advanced manufacturing center that brings in additional technology. We would be able to offer even more cutting edge training to our students in terms of the placement. So I'm not worried about our students being placed because we provide the right kind of training. With advanced manufacturing center, we are able to create a brand new certificate. I shared that last time with you, 3D technology certificate, which is in the area of 3D printing and it is an interdisciplinary program that faculty came together and created. It will offer opportunities to high school students and also to our own undergraduate students no matter what major they can have the certificate program on the side. In terms of the plumbing and electrical apprenticeship program, I believe Catherine mentioned to you last time that this particular program now we have started to offer it remotely and therefore our enrollment almost doubled because working professionals can take advantage of such offer. There's investment in technology and also due to COVID, you know, we had to pivot so our faculty got the experience or built the experience of teaching some of these programs We have new funding to continue and expand on global boundaries maintenance technical apprenticeship program, which is a program that we have for many years now, but that program would be expanded so we would recruit more high school students probably from CTEs who are more technically oriented and the opportunity in the semiconductor industry they need lot more workers in that area. Were you really partnered with global family on this? That's a complete partnership. Great. We basically train their employees so any new higher they will have they will hire into that apprenticeship program, it's a three-year program, then we teach the technical side and they get to work on their job for the rest of the hours and it's a very good, very good program. Dental therapy program is also one of the programs that were not wanted really badly and there are very few institutions in the country who has that program is a new field between the dentists and the dental hygiers. It's like almost a dental, like a physician's assistant, right? They can do certain things, maybe a filling, cleanings. So they can do more things than a dental hygiers but little less than the dentist. So that program, we have brought it back on track and it is we are now developing, finalizing their curriculum and we will be submitting our CODA accreditation application within the next few months. So Mr. President, you don't have you don't have students in that program right now, so you are in the process. So with regard to getting people sort of in the field four years down the road, would you say, six years when we might start to see dental assistants in the workforce, any idea? Not before four years. Not before four years, okay. Okay, yeah. If we, the past that we have now restarted the program, we are now at a path that we may be able to admit students next fall. If everything goes well and we get quickly a accreditation. If we are not able to do it in the fall, we may have to start in the spring. Thereafter it takes, you know, four years and beyond for the completion of the program. Question. So UDM has a dental hygienists program. So you're going to dovetail with their program or is it going to be a separate program in Randolph? Right, so VTC also have a dental hygiene program and so do Mr. Vermont. The dental therapy program, according to our Kodak accreditation that the party that will look at the program, they do not yet do not have a path for a dental hygienist to come in and just take, you know, one year or two year courses to get to dental therapy. They are asking us to develop a standalone dental therapy program. Some skills of the dental hygienists would be required. We would need to meet that, but it's a, it would be an independent program. Dental association has to, over time, they will get there. Right now, they haven't envisioned a program that builds on hygienists and then to therapy and then to the dental school. Chancellor, did you want to add anything there? I see a look up. Not sure, a puzzle mentor. Well, Kodak is, I mean, again, specialty programs like engineering and then dental therapy have to have special, meet special accreditation requirements. So NETCHI, the new in the commission for higher education, generally accredits are institutions. But Kodak is the one for the dental hygiene and dental therapy. And again, they're very, it's very challenging. So we're somewhat at the whim of the accreditor in terms of that timeline that you meet twice a year. Yeah, sure. You know, so again, if everything goes perfectly, maybe we could do it by full of 24, but 25 is like the more realistic. The reason I asked that is because we hear about declining student population, you know, if we're competing with our own schools, same thing with the CTE programs, if the traditional high schools are competing with the CTE high schools, you know, maybe this would be a good thing and we'll actually bring students into the state, which is what we'd hope for. And we're also going to be kind of growing our own contractors and technicians because there's a shortage in the state. So I'm just, you have the physical facility to increase what you're doing. So for this particular program, dental therapy, we already have built the sim lab. So we are ready for that. In terms of all the other manufacturing, engineering and other programs, currently we do have the facilities that we need. Broadband workforce, that's a new, you know, a lot of grants in that area right now. We would need to produce the train, the technicians who can lay the optic fiber for that particular program. We are developing a specialized program for that, like an apprenticeship that would most likely be ready to go by spring. So that's another, you know, workforce related program that we do have. Corporate rhythm. Yeah, that's okay. No, no, no, I guess I was thinking that what else I need to highlight, the critical occupation scholarship would be an important one to continue so that some of, you know, the needs to, even the college students, if they can take advantage of that, that would be good to produce our own, you know, technically market force. A CTE collaboration is very important to us personally, especially from VTC's perspective. We need to really figure out new ways to build these collaborations because this is a group of students, you know, who are inclined to go into those areas who would seek out CTE's at early age. And if we can build a better way, you know, financial arrangements, whatever we can do to have a seamless pipeline. With the new way of delivering some of the even technically oriented programs, of course, in hands-on that will occur physically at a particular site. But some of the technical stuff can be shared with the students and or students could be taught remotely as well. So VTC would be looking for opportunities where we could partner with CTE's more and use our faculty to deliver some of the technical material while they can get hands-on experience with the facilities CTE's have. That it's not an easy piece to, you know, further develop, but we need to be kind of think innovatively how we can do that. And VTC would be willing to partner with every CTE in the state. If you can kind of think about the funding mechanisms that make sense for everybody. So curiosity along this line, the demographics of CTE, are they primarily younger students who are coming out of CTE's or are they mid-career students? Which, who's that? You mean the demographics for VTC? VTC, right. VTC, we get both kinds of students. We are getting students that are traditional age, some even from out of state for especially engineering programs, but we also get a lot of mountain teaching students. Yeah, I can't answer that question as of today. It may depend on the program. I mean, for example, nursing, we know the nursing, the average age of our nursing students is around 29, 30 years old. Okay, that's all. Right, so for a lot of them second career or whatever, or they're working, we've got kids. Again, we do serve a lot of non-traditional students. I would imagine the most of the CTE ones though, if they're coming from CTEs, they can be more of the traditional age students. Okay, okay. Yeah, nursing being one of the largest programs, so that balance will shift towards more, 50% or so students would be non-traditional. So your nursing program, again, just to have a sense of a a third of your student population at BTC? Oh, exactly. Oh, right, wow. And if we combine it with our Pasad and student population, we are close to 800 or so students in the nursing programs. And a few weeks from now, we will have a nursing program, a creditor coming to Gas Center for our master's program. So we would be training our educators also through the master's program. So within our state colleges, about 800 nurses are in the pipeline? Exactly. Yeah, by the beginning. We'll make it one of you, including the CCB students. Very, okay. It's great. Correct. Okay, okay. Yes, Senator. Quick question with for those 800 nursing students, do you have any idea how many tend to stay in the state or how many decide to become traveling nurses or just go somewhere else? Most of our nursing students are in-state students. So there are two monitors. Right, sorry. I meant after they graduate. After they graduate, we don't know. I think this traveling nursing is a recent phenomenon. So we don't say. A lot of CR may have something. I can answer that. About 83% of our nurses license in Vermont after graduating with the average age in the VTC program being 29 to 30 and with the dispersed program around the state. We're really talking about students that are already embedded in their communities and so the lore of the travel opportunities is not as robust for somebody who's 30, 31, 32 lives in this for somebody who's 22 to 24. So 83 licensing in the state. I'm not sure I could tell you how many are still licensed in Vermont quite year hence, but that's a really, really strong statistic for us. And we're graduating about 375 across all of the steps in the ladder program. So practical nurses, associates, RNs, educators. That's true. They're going to master's program to come. Right. Great. And one more thing about the facilities for the nursing programs because we are a distributed nursing program because as Katherine mentioned they are mostly working people and for them we do need to continuously improve our delivery method technology. How we deliver with the limited faculty all the course work at these different sites. They need to be you know, we need practical sites. We need the labs where they can do the simulation work and then get into the hospitals. Those collaborations with hospitals are also another piece that's so localized in different parts of the state. And therefore anything we can do to further improve our technology deliver the systems to make the learning environment better Thank you so much. Sure. Ms. Emerson. I'll be right back. Okay. All right. I didn't have a question for you. All right. Thank you very much, Mr. President. Yeah, sure. Very, very helpful. Very helpful. There's anything else? No. No. Okay. I think we have Mr. Bagnini. Okay. Let me bring him in. Two more folks. Okay. Get over to DTC. Yeah. So what's going on? Yeah. It's like you can't even envision. Can I talk to you? You were a strategic plan for including your physical facilities. Yeah. Because as you add students, you're going to have to, and technology changes, you're going to have to add that. Exactly. Yeah. Very just. Good to see you. Good to see you. That's it. We are institutions this morning. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Rob, thanks for joining us. Good to see you. Good to see you too, Mr. Bagnini. How are you today? Good thanks. Have you had an opportunity to listen into some of the conversation? Yes. Yep. Great. I'll let you take the call. Jody and the DTC president. Great. Great. So I see you have a power point that you're going to take us through. Is that accurate? Great. Yep. Am I like the great powerful eyes up here on a big screen or something? You, well, you're not huge, but yeah, you're about to have you're about a half a screen, maybe a little less. Yeah. So why don't we, are you able to pull that up? Sure. All right. So Hayden will pull up the power point. All right. Hayden will turn it to the share of the screen. Yeah. I think we'll have you pull it up. Yeah. If you want such a change. I think we'll just have to pull it up. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. This is Bennington, we hear about Bennington. All right. Okay. So go ahead. The floor is yours. Okay. So Hayden, are you going to be clicking for me? Is that how we're going to move through this? Yes. Yeah. When you want him to move it, just give him the word. I'll just do a little the little clicky clicky. So, okay. Sounds good. Well, again, Hayden, if you could scroll back up to the top there, that'd be great. There we go. Awesome. So again, my name is Rob Bonney. I work at Southwest Tech, which is the Regional Technical High School for Bennington County. I'm also the President of Vactia, which is the Vermont Adult Career and Technical Education Association. So I'm really coming to you with two hats on today, though you can see I'm actually wearing no hat. I guess that would have been funny if I had two hats on, but so that's really, I serve the dual role in presenting to you today on this. So I'm going to talk to you a little bit about Southwest Tech first, then I'm going to move into discussing Adult Career and Technical Education statewide. So Hayden, can you click to the next screen, please? So like I mentioned, Southwest Tech serves all the high schools in Bennington County. That is Mount Anthony, which is Bennington, Arlington, Burren Burton, which is Manchester and Long Trail and Dorset. And we also have students who come to us from Hoosick Falls over in New York. We get about 200 students, I'm sorry, 400 students throughout the year. And there's a list of the programs that we have. I like to list these programs because the first little arrow there is the programs that you would typically think of that a technical center would have, though we have some others that people don't always realize could also be housed in a tech center. Pre-law is one. I believe we're the only tech center in Vermont that has a pre-law program. But we do also have business and accounting, graphic arts, law enforcement, and also TV and video production. So we have a wide variety of programs here. They are not all what you would think of as the typical shop classes. And so we really serve a wide variety of students with a lot of different types of interests. We've heard from some folks that they have, they're having to turn away a lot of students. Is that accurate down our way as well that you're getting a lot of students who are interested, but you just can't fit them in or do facilities allow for larger populations? Sure. So there are certain programs that we do have long waiting lists for, in particular auto technology. And there's one that we always get more applications for than we can accommodate. And Mike Waller, who is our superintendent, has been desperately trying to come up with a way where we can have either a satellite auto technology program in the North Shire or expand the auto technology program that we have. Obviously a shop is a very expensive thing, an auto shop. But that is one program where we do have to pretty much every year turn away students. Most of our other programs were able to accommodate the vast majority of students who want to attend. Medical professions is another one sometimes where we don't have enough seats because that's a very popular program as well. Though I would say most of the others were able to have full or close to full depending on the year. Building trades is also very popular as well. So it kind of depends on the year. The auto technology is certainly one where we are often having to turn away students. Southwest tech is lucky. We are attached to Mount Anthony Union high school so it is very easy for students just to come over here to take classes so that is a huge advantage and we have, I think one of the newest tech centers in Vermont. ours was built in the mid 90s I believe. Southwest tech and also river valley over in Springfield I think are the two newest buildings. But you know the 1990s I was in high school then so that's still a while ago the building is starting to show its age a little bit. Rob what about a young person and I think this will go to you Jody also who wants to be a teacher? Is there any opportunity here you ever considered letting people into these creating a program where somebody can try teaching out just to see in their senior or junior year if it's something that they might like. Yeah so our human services program is focused on early education so certain people in there who want to be preschool teachers or early educators elementary educators though people in there often are also focused on perhaps working with people with developmental disabilities or social work or something like that. I know the agency of education I think through Perkins offered like a tech ed teacher curriculum so somebody who's interested in becoming a tech ed teacher could also enroll in human services and perhaps learn about how to become a teacher a CTE teacher as well. I don't remember the name of that off the top of my head but that's an option so it is focused on early education but students who are interested in that field certainly do often enroll in the human services program and we're lucky we have a child care that's attached to it's a community child care but it's attached to the human services classroom so they have their own their own lab of sometimes crying and screaming children next door but it's a good introduction to what early education can be. Well just leave that little nugget that you know we are looking for people to try out what it's like to teach high school what it's like to teach middle school elementary school get them in you know to be assistant teachers para educators they're certainly in need we you know that we have that we're down about a thousand school personnel right now a thousand plus many of those are teachers and trying the job before jumping into it makes a lot of sense Randolph has an education program so I know some students that have attended that program are able to go and work in elementary schools for example great you definitely don't want a high school student working in high school good point yeah we use the human services program very similar to what they have yeah before I came to CBCC and they did get rid of it I think there was low enrollment and I think that happened there were some changes around licensing of child care facilities and I think that CBCC decided to not do that piece for whatever reason and I wasn't there so I don't know but they removed that because they did have child care there when I was a teacher at Spalding okay but the program was removed before I got there for long enrollment okay thank you okay Rob please continue great thank you senator campion so my specialty is adult technical education and I don't just call it adult ed because people get mixed things mixed up so there's adult technical education which is done at the technical centers and then there's adult basic education which is done here in Bennington areas with two Bennington Manchester the tutorial center and then there are other Vermont adult learning and other areas so I make sure to say adult technical education just so that we're clear that we're talking about the tech centers here so at Southwest Tech my goal is to serve about 100 people a year in person and online we offer a variety of different programs that offer people skills that they need to either upskill or go into a new job generally entry level type jobs then I partner with the typical players that you would expect Department of Labor reach up higher ability local industries all those other groups to help find out what their needs are and also work with the agencies who can refer people to me to take the classes can you click to the next slide please Hayden so just a little sample of what adult technical education looks like at Southwest Tech our most popular program here is licensed nursing assistant LNAs are in high need throughout Vermont especially as we have an aging population more and more people need LNA services that is our most popular program here we also offer commercial drivers license we have a CNC machining class starting next week dental assisting is a new one here a dental assistant is an entry level position in the dental field and my organization Bactea is partnering with Vermont State Dental Society on this to develop a viable and easily portable dental assisting program and so we're just out of the pilot phase and enrollment is increasing which is great and I also do custom courses for industry as well specifically I partner with command composites which is just down the road we just completed an Excel class for a bunch of their employees we're going to be doing more work with them moving forward so we do have some new classes starting as you can I put them in bolts they're a little easier to see there welding we have a computer basics class we have a lot of people in our community that meet computer skills so that's going to be starting computer skills will be starting at the end of February and then this summer my four-stream heavy equipment teacher is offered to teach a heavy equipment operation class a small heavy equipment operation class over the summer as well for folks who want to learn how to operate heavy machinery so we also have some online offerings that are popular medical administrative assistant IT support specialist and legal secretaries so and those online programs do offer industry recognized credentials that people can earn after completing the program so in addition to the on the ground sit here in the classroom and or be out in the lab we do have some online offerings for folks who who schedule don't permit for them to come here to the tech center we try and keep tuition affordable so that there's a good value in what we do and so I just wanted to show you the range of what it costs to take a class here obviously CDL is going to be the most expensive based on the cost of having a truck a teacher diesel fuel maintenance of the truck all those types of things but we can do others like the computer basis class that I talked about we can do that fairly inexpensively and I do want to point out that in a lot of ways Vsac is really our number one partner in these classes Mary Lynn Turchikoff and all the EOC counselors around the state including Martha McCoggan who handles the western part of Vermont you know they really really do yeoman's work and making sure that the funding is available for adult learners who want to take the classes at all the tech centers that that money is if at all possible available to them to cover the tuition low and middle income people in Vermont we encourage them all to work with Vsac because they're generous and the money is there for people to take these classes so I wanted to make sure I had a shout out to Vsac in his presentation as well most of these programs are fairly short term which is important adults have lives they have children to take care of they have other jobs to go to so we try and keep these programs compact so that they can get the skills that they need and again get up the skill to get a promotion at work or find a new job and what I'd like to point out is a lot of these programs that we offer are on the McClure's list of top jobs in Vermont that I keep right here on my desk so you know we many of our tech centers use that as a guide when developing adult technical education programs as well based on these are things that we're looking for here in the state Hayden can you click for me please so Rob just so you know in terms of our timing we've got about seven minutes before we've got to move to Rotland so hopefully that works for you no problem I've only got three more slides to go and I'll be great thank you yep there are 17 tech centers in Vermont the little stars there on the map kind of show you where they are though southwest tech seems to be sitting on Stanford for some reason I'm not quite sure why that is but every tech center has somebody in the administrative adult education role though it's inequity it's it really varies around the state we have some tech centers that do very little with adult technical education and we have some that do a lot in adult technical education and so certain regions of the state are being better served than others through adult technical education like I mentioned I'm the president of Vactia so I did want to mention that our organization has a website that we we really work hard to drive traffic to and we list all the classes with the tech centers on that website so folks across from Ron who are interested in adult technical education program not only can go to the each technical center's website but can go to our association's website and see what classes are being offered we do focus on industry recognized credentials because that's important and that's something that the state is looking for and that's something that some employers are looking for and I do want to point out that high school students are eligible and encouraged to enroll in these IRC granting programs so we talk about adult education but it doesn't necessarily mean the second you graduate from high school many of these programs including LNA especially are available to high school students as well so I listed a whole bunch of examples of classes that are offered LNA CDL and welding tend to be the most widely offered throughout Vermont but certain regions have specialties as well and I've listed them for you just to see the wide variety of programs that are offered through adult technical education in the state and of course some places have a teacher who can teach something really interesting that locals may be interested in so you can see that some of those are things that we also continue to offer locally depending on a teacher's availability can you give me another click there Hayden I think this is my most powerful slide here and what I really want to point out to the committee is that adult technical education serves a lot of students I really believe we're a hidden gem sometimes we get a little forgotten about in the CTE conversations but over the last four years we've served a lot of students and you can see we have a very high completion rate for our classes and you know we've issued almost 3300 industry recognized credentials over the last four years so we're a significant contributor to getting to those goals of having a what was it 75 by 25 or something like that having you know a lot of Vermonters certified and having industry recognized credentials and we've been a huge contributor to that through adult technical education though we have one big center who's not been able to report yet on their 22 only two numbers and so these are going to go up a little bit next year I do want to point this out and that's why it's in bold there are five centers and I have an error in there because I'm not from the northeast kingdom next to Dub Lyndon Institute should actually be St. John's Berry Academy so my apologies on that mix up there but there are four centers that have a full-time person adult and adult technical education Southwest Tech is one of them Stafford who you'll sound like you're going to hear from next North Country St. John's Berry Academy and the Center for Technology in Essex is a big enroller of students and but we are serving the five of us are serving more than half of the students in adult technical education the other the other 15 centers generally have somebody part-time and very part-time doing adult ad who are serving the other 50 percent so if you are in Bennington or Rutland County the Northeast Kingdom or Chittenden County you've got pretty good access to adult technical education any others area of the state it's a little more spotty depending on how much time and energy that person has to devote to adult Tech and then can we just click to my last slide there Hayden I just wanted to put some takeaways on there for all of you folks again don't forget adult Tech ad is out there in this CTE conversation we believe that we're a very effective and nimble part of this program we can respond quickly when an industry needs some training we've got great classrooms and labs that are dark at night but we can utilize these things and programs for adults can be there and my mantra is short-term cost-effective and flexible CTE training that's really what we do as well the challenges honestly in some reasons are finding students to fill classes to make them economically viable and also finding willing instructors in some fields you make a lot more money as I work in the BTC conversation make a lot more money in industry than you do teaching and funding for adult CTE is somewhat inequitable around the state and in many cases inadequate to fund and making sure that there's time energy and facilities to offer these programs in certain regions of the state and grants common grants go you know and we struggle each year to know where the money is coming from for adult CTE so really our big ask and our big goal you know my job as president of Actia is a more consistent commitment to adult CTE statewide so that's our ask that's our hope and making sure that folks remember that adult CTE is a big part of this CTE system as you saw on the numbers in the previous slides Rob that was great that was that was incredibly helpful so again and you guys also you're getting kids from 10th grade or 11th grade on 11th and 12th grade is that when they're entering yeah I mean predominantly seniors will take an adult technical education course but we do get some years in LNA because LNAs only have to be 16 to have that job so we occasionally get some juniors but mostly seniors for LNA and CDL when we ran EMT here we would get some seniors from the health professions class in EMT as well so it's I mean they're a captive audience they're already here and we can get them an IRC so you know why if you're here in high school why why not leave with an IRC in hand so especially in some of these high needs field so we try and make sure we offer that to our high school seniors as well and there is funding through the Department of Labor right now for high school seniors to enroll in an IRC course through a technical center so we're trying to tap that funding as well committee questions and I know I blew a lot there so yeah no it's great it's incredibly helpful so the youngest so can you get a ninth grader who wants to jump in I go to the graduation just about every year or you know the awards assembly down at the Elks and it's great I mean it's incredible and I guess I'm just thinking if I'm sitting next to a kid who's been studying cosmetology how long have they been doing this you know is it usually just their senior years if they're junior senior year yeah so the students that graduated the awards ceremony those are program students and those are generally they've been in the program since 11th and 12th grade in the program yeah yep yeah those are generally students who have gone through two years of a program for cosmetology sometimes it's even a little bit longer just based on a number of things they have to get that's one program that's a little more challenging especially at a half day tech center I think one thing that I just CTE in general you need to know is that some CTE centers in Vermont are full day centers students come all day I think that may be the case for for Bill and at Stafford and Southwest Tech is a half day center so we're all held to the same standards which is a little challenging when you only have students for half a day versus full day what we're expected to be accountable for so you know there is there are different there are different governance structures around the state and there are also different daytime structures on how long we have the students during the day and that's and that's important to keep in mind it's not only comparing apples to apples right and some of that are have the kids they're full day with their half day program so it's two hours a day is a half day program for CTE four hours a day is a full day program for CTE so CBCC is full day but we don't yet have the kids full day we haven't for the four hour program Senator Fuller generally speaking would it be helpful to have more uniformity around governance and okay I'm getting the sense that yes maybe well I'm not sure governance is really the problem it's funding right and I think Jody would agree with me it really is about equitable funding and putting a system in place where we are not competing with the high schools for funding and it's also an issue of scheduling because especially at a large place like Stafford that has like 10 sending schools you know every school that they serve has a different schedule you know here at Southwest Tech we have three different schedules we're trying to balance so I mean those are some real logistical things that would be very very helpful to to solve as opposed to what type of board do you have you know like I think all our boards do a good job that we're helping us manage our centers but we have these other huge logistical issues that cause a lot of problems and trying to get students an equitable amount of time in the program and you know funding can is a disincentive to send to you know daytime students I'm not talking about adult students here you know that's a huge job so a non-competitive funding model would be I think item number one yeah I've been hearing about that for years yeah I mean we have different amounts of sending schools coming to us I have six we have different they all have different graduation requirements that's what our high schools did across the state so there's so many things that are different across the state it's hard to pin point one but funding is certainly the area where we could we can collaborate more and compete less just in our weeks I do have a question but I I see we're a little time constrained is Rob going to stay online yeah Rob can you stick around for a little while yeah I can stick around for a little while I just have to head out by a 430 I very I oh yeah we'll be done I think we're probably about 20 minutes or so for a little maybe a little longer for our next person great okay is Mr. Lucci I think Mr. Lucci is here yeah okay hey Bill how are you good how are you doing good thanks so much for joining us my pleasure and to the invitation yeah so I believe yep you sent us a presentation and you want to have him share screen is that better great okay oh terrific and you want to take us through it and then we'll jump in with some questions we've got about 20 minutes or so if that works for you sure yep that'll work we'll fly through the slides yeah just I saw Terry Williams leave he's my fellow citizen of Holtney he'll be back he'll be back he'll be back okay that's yeah he'll be back yes so so I'm I'm Bill Lucci I'm the assistant director for adult tech at here at Stafford Technical Center in Rotland been doing it for close to 20 20 years and just by way of the some other things that I'm involved in I'm the chair of the committee for career and technical institutions at the New England Association of Schools and Colleges Jody was talking about comprehensive high schools Massachusetts and Connecticut have some of the best comprehensive high school technical centers I'd be real as the chair of the committee for career and technical institutions I'd be happy to set up a field trip for you if you ever want to go and see a four-year comprehensive high school career and technical center in one of those two states I'm also was appointed by Governor Scott to the Vermont Standards Board or professional educators so I sit on that board representing the administrators for the state of Vermont and my little girl who's graduating in June from Rutland High School Governor Scott was kind enough to appoint her to the State Board of Education so she's been that's terrific yeah she's been sitting on for a couple of years she always says we had her in committee last year she was terrific thanks well she's my boss and I tell her she's not so that's a little background for me if you wouldn't mind progressing to the next slide Hayden thanks so I don't know if you've seen this this wonderful billboard billboards are illegal in the state of Vermont but if you put wheels on them they're not and here is compliments of the the agency of education put out a competitive grant last year Act 51 we won one of those awards and we used it to promote workforce development and career technical education for our commercial driver's license training program so this this rascal goes anywhere from Bennington all the way down the middle barrier in that Route 7 corridor and we get a lot of mileage and a lot of a lot of commentary on that that it rolled out in November so it's a pretty nice little thank you very much now next slide so a little promotion for New England Association of Schools and Colleges we got our accreditation visit last November and they came to our school for four days to determine whether or not we deserve to be accredited again and the chair of the committee after he left he said your school is just crazy and amazing I think he meant that as a compliment to our school next slide please Hayden, thank you so our focus on workforce development in my area is thinking globally not just what Vermont needs but what the country needs as well and frequently they're in parity and we're required to treat workforce development as a business here by our school board Roland city public school school board so I'm required to break even with anything that I do and offer in order to sustain the efforts of our workforce development program next slide please so we start with like knowing the people in our community in our Rutland community there are customers so we're frequently out there talking with area businesses trying to develop cultivate meaningful relationships with them and asking them like what do you need for your incumbent workers and what do you need for the people that you're looking to recruit into your organizations that takes time but it's been pretty profitable and fruitful for us next slide please here's some of our recent customers within the last year or so the spa at the woods in killington cedar hill continuing care community Genesis healthcare agramar Cisco and harborton forge are just a few of the businesses that we've provided workforce development training for in the last year all of these people are you know high paying and demand jobs and healthcare manufacturing commercial transportation and then also in personal care next slide please our educational collaboration we work closely with ed to go which was purchased by Cengage learning to operate a number of our online courses that we do we work with from on adult learning to facilitate their ability to access these courses without having to use a state credit card all the time they'll sign their students up and then we will build them for that so we actually handle the registration process and payment process and they reimburse us which has proved to be pretty helpful in terms of their ability to get their clients access to online training from I can't say enough about Vermont Tech our relationship with them over the last 20 years has been nothing short of amazing in particular with General Electric just to be general electric aviation they divested in their GE aerospace now that based here in Rutland with 1500 employees we do Yeoman share of their apprenticeship program training and workforce development in conjunction with BTC and we've done the Vermont prior to COVID we did the Vermont state electrical and plumbing apprenticeship program through VTC and a variety of other initiatives along the way including getting their dairy farm management students from their Randolph campus their CDLs down here in Rutland we partnered with them to make that happen for them and next slide please our agency connections VTrans we've just won our second three year contract to deliver customized accelerated four-day all-day welding and metal fabrication training to a hundred-plus state municipal garage employees over the last couple of years we do it right here in Rutland for them those those incumbent workers are paid they come from as far north as Lowell and as far south as Wilmington and from towns the west and east in virgins and St. John'sbury they all converge on our campus in the summer and we do this intensive training customized training for VTrans we also worked with the Vermont Department of Labor to help some kids who were struggling who had graduated and had no career plans and we did an eight-week career and technical education exploratory summer program for them so that more than a dozen kids could come in and experience career possible careers in video production electrical culinary arts and welding and small engine repair and next slide please our allied health sector we work with partnership with community health they operate 10 community health centers in the Rutland region and two now two dental clinics providing we customized a program for them on site and put so far we put 45 people through the certified clinical medical assistant program that we developed along with their their partners or I'm sorry the practice leaders at each of those facilities and we've delivered a program to a training program for them where at the end if they passed the licensing test they earn a credential from the National Health Career Association we've done a medical coding certificate program with Rutland Regional Medical Center working with their staff and those people didn't necessarily stay in Rutland many of them are now working at Helen Porter Springfield Hospital Gifford as well as Rutland Regional Medical Center and the largest long-term care facility in Rutland is the Pines and we they were kind enough to always offer us a space to do the clinical program part of our LNA program and during COVID when we were prevented from providing training because our schools were closed the Pines created a classroom for us there where we could actually bring our teacher and our students on site at the Pines and the Pines served as our remote classroom during COVID so that we can continue to provide licensed nurse assistants that we desperately needed especially during COVID to area nursing homes next slide please transportation sector we've we've got the only CDLA B an upgrade program in the state that's operated through a career and technical center VA program means tractor trailer license we have a tractor trailer and we we do this program and been doing it for about 12 years we do it only on Saturday so people who are employed and cannot afford to go to the proprietary schools quit their jobs and go five days a week eight hours a day for eight weeks we do it on Saturdays takes you a little bit longer to get the license but it enables people to continue to have a revenue stream coming into their household and one of our outstanding partners to sell away systems we we hybridized our CDL B curriculum for them so that they could expedite incumbent workers through a certified license program like ours and get the CDL in two weeks the B license in two weeks through Coachella and return for that sharing our curriculum with them they were kind enough to build us a remote a classroom in West Rotland that was far nicer than the one we were renting in North Clarendon and we now share that space with the cell away systems we don't have to pay rent or utilities and it's a much finer learning environment for our students that are coming in who are not to sell our employees next slide manufacturing and technology we go down to Browboro for VTC and have provided academic evaluation and assessment for candidates in the GS precision program that they have a program that's delivered by VTC but VTC asked us if we would go down and evaluate candidates for suitability for enrollment in that program when we go down there and do that in Browboro OMEA which is a local calcium carbonate manufacturing facility in Florence Vermont just up the road from us they asked for us to create an industrial maintenance troubleshooting program for them and computer tech skills combined with computer technology skills we created that program for them and delivered it on site in Florence and as Ari mentioned GE aerospace we've developed custom design welding and metal fabrication classes for them using titanium which is their primary metal that they're used over on the plant to make veins and blades for aviation and we did for four years we did for their human resource department all of the all of the employment skills testing for candidates who had applied we did all of the screening and only sent to them the people who passed the skills test that GE required in order to be interviewed in four years we did over 900 candidates to general electric aviation and we deployed those those screening skills or those screening tests to these applicants on holidays weekends and nights so that they could continue to work in whatever job they were in while they were applying to GE GE aerospace and next slide so just I know that Hayden might have distributed copies of the slides you can see some of the workforce development programs that we've done that I've just spoke of in number of hours and what what credential is earned and the employment options that they have and some of the programs that we deploy here at Stafford next slide so we put the work and our workforce development strategy so what we get is I get tremendous support from the Rutland City Board of School Commissioners and the Rutland taxpayers to be here full-time and doing what I'm doing we've got our VSAC outreach counselor and Martha McCoggin is absolutely unbelievable and connecting people with any financial opportunities that are available for our adult students we have customer-sensitive pricing strategies so we keep our prices deliberately low so that our the funding available to VSAC is generally enough to cover the cost of any of the employment programs that we're offering through us employer buy-in for fee-for-service philosophy so GE Aviation was paying us about $37,000 a year to do all of their pre-employment screening so that money went directly back into the coffers of the taxpayers of the great city of Rutland anytime you're making money for the city they tend to be very happy with that with that strategy seeing money coming in and not just money going out we have direct access to school-based high-tech classrooms here in our facility we're pretty fortunate to be able to do that all of our things are tied to end-of-training credentials that credentials of value or a license we don't offer any workforce development program that does not lead to a credential or a license that's going to get somebody employed that employers appreciate and next slide we've taken it beyond our region last year we got a call from Byrne Burton Academy and enrolled six Byrne Burton high school seniors in five different programs here in our night programs kids that did not know what they were going to do when they were going to graduate in June they enrolled in our programs they were in welding they were in CDL they were in phlebotomy they're in our cosmetology program at night and we just love Byrne Burton Academy Chairman we love Byrne Burton thank you and we assembled a cohort of a dozen LNAs from outside of our region there's a medication nurse assistant program that leads to a credential an MNA credential that's tied to their existing LNA license there's only two perhaps three but there are only two tech centers in the state North Country and our center that offered the MNA so what we did was for Bethel, Springfield and Randolph they had a bunch of LNAs who needed that credential but couldn't find a place to do it so we hybridized our program we made it both on site here at Stafford a couple days a week and then we went to their long-term care facilities where they were employed and we we got it was a total of 14 started off and a dozen finished and got their MNA credential so they would be able to do the med carts in long-term care facilities to help out because of staffing issues that credential allowed them to work alongside a nurse at RN or BSN and actually deliver and dispense certain medications to patients in long-term care facilities and the last one it's appropriate to say thanks thanks for giving me the opportunity to squeeze everything in in 20 minutes I'll take any questions that you it was it was terrific Bill I think one thing that I'm just going to it's a bit of an ask for all three of you if you could get together and I don't know who would take the lead on this but if we could get you know five or six points from all of you what we could do legislatively or what you need from us to expand to broaden whatever the work that you're doing so I would think what might be on there do we look to to give greater access to a wider range of kids do we make sure that you're all part of the facilities inventory and then anything else whether it's funding uh access to capital etc if you wouldn't mind taking a week and kind of thinking about that maybe two weeks we can have whatever and come back maybe Jody could come back or zoom in and just provide that to us that would be helpful is that okay that reasonable yeah okay and Hayden will loop back do you need a week yeah do you need a week I'll be back next weekend and we'll see how it's coming all right questions any other questions yeah please so having the three different representatives here simultaneously it's a phenomenal opportunity so we in a different committee we've been discussing child care and we have a obviously statewide we have a lack of child care providers but I think Jody an hour ago or so mentioned that they used to have a program but the program folded I'm just kind of wondering what the impediments are to you know if we have an L1A program could could we you know is it conceivable to have a child care provider program resurrected in the state it's just just and generalized we we do have one here for the high school side and it's generally full it's not considered child care it's a literature based preschool but we to bring the kids in each of the high school students that are enrolled in the program are matched up with a tuition paying youngster from the community they're between the ages of four and six before they actually start public school so it's sort of child care but our teacher bristles if you use that word they say we're a literature based child education program and it does it's been doing really really well here for a number of years so it's it's helping people in the community we need child care and it's helping our students to actually have hands on opportunity to educate little children over the course of the school year which is great it's a great program and what I can say from the adult dead side as we had a the follow-up on what Bill said there we had a program we tried to launch statewide last year called step up the child care it ran as a pilot program up at North Country Career Center before COVID hit and you know multiple tech centers tried to launch step up the child care and none of us were able to successfully enroll enough students to make that program viable so the the problems that child care centers are having finding staff is the same problem we're having finding people to enroll in a training program for child care and there were multiple reasons for that you know people didn't want to pay the tuition to enroll in that it's a low paying field so why would I do a training expensive training program to you know take a low paying job CCV already does some of this stuff through the Northern Lights program so it has been tried through adult technical education unfortunately nobody was able to find enough people to make it financially viable to run that program with their center I would say that through our comprehensive local needs assessment I would do every two years for Perkins we find out what our community wants what our local industries want what our students want and it is not rising to the top in central Vermont for us I know that there's clearly a need it's not among the top five even for us of what people want of what students want to go into or what industry is calling for I think our schools our sending schools are looking for a way to do that and I bet we could partner with them because they have teachers who young teachers who are having children can't find child care and that causes a problem too with your teacher it ends up being a stay at home mom instead or stay at home dad instead of being at school so that it is certainly a need and I heard that low low income piece like to start a program we have to prove it's high demand high income high scale and so now if that's true if it's not among that list and I think the list can help us to put some stuff up there that's not maybe high income but we have to make sure we jump through all these hoops before we can start a program so now that that program has left my facility it's going to be very difficult to bring it back if I'm not getting that feedback from my community can you repeat high demand high income high high demand high wage high scale anybody working with the agency of agriculture I heard quite a bit this morning continue to in the eye committee around meat processing things like that I know food hubs are developing in all of our communities anybody now okay okay good to know okay senator campion one of the things I'd like to point out is that all this cool stuff you just heard from me and bell we are two people full time that have the resources to be able to do these cool things that you just heard about right not every region of the state has this and so we talked about some neat stuff but you know we're two of the people that have the time and the resources to be able to do this I appreciate that it's not full time and we have two courses for Adele and for a lot of reasons but that's one of them okay senator colliff thank you I wanted to ask you this earlier but I didn't want to interrupt I know that Mr. Lucci you mentioned the comprehensive tech technical school CTE comprehensive school Beth Cobb mentioned that to me too and I asked her how would we do that in Vermont I feel as though we don't have the scale we don't have the population we don't have the economies of scale and I asked her would this be like a boarding school type of situation because yeah anyway go ahead well the the schools that I probably with my association with the ask I probably evaluated for accreditation two dozen schools in the last seven or eight years in Massachusetts in Connecticut and you're right I mean that obviously the population density in both of those states far exceeds what we have the capacity to do but if you look at what's happening in Massachusetts especially they're actually building their their waiting lists are so robust for CTE full-time comprehensive high schools that they they're the Massachusetts building committee that they have through the governor's office they're actually building there's one that just opened up that we did last year in Lexington, Massachusetts one of the most affluent communities Minuteman High School four-year comprehensive high school but the cost of the school was $340 million dollars to bill so and it's a wonderful school and it's got a really nice I think they've got 11 sending communities that actually send it there sends kids there you know if we had I've always thought that Terry will probably smile at this but I always thought that it would be nice to turn Greenmount College into a residential CTE school a high school slash CTE school where you could put kids up and you and people throughout the state would send kids there I think it would be a great great opportunity for Greenmount College speaking as a polly tax payer probably the new order might want to talk to you what's that so maybe the new order would want to talk to you yeah yeah Senator she so I have a question that I don't know is going to be able to fit in two minutes but it's it's kind of all three of you uh you know I was thinking about the 529 college plans and you know I was I'm just trying to think of different creative ways to support the college saving plans to encourage students and adults to go into these different trades or to enroll in these different courses and I was wondering if you if any of you might have any thoughts or input on the on PSAC PSAC right PSAC's awesome my feedback um again the the EOC division that supports what we do an adult tech ad that I can't say enough Maryland Church of Cops always says she's our number one fan so um and we always really appreciate their support so um they are that part of it at least is as well resourced and supports what Bill and I and all the other adult tech ed people do very very well so I have you find that a lot of students are using those college plans to finance their courses not through adult tech ad because we're not offering college credit in our programs so we're not eligible to receive those funds but PSAC has what's called their advancement grant program which is specifically for industry recognized credential workforce credential programs non-degree credit no credit program and that advancement grant program that can be used for for CTEs for adults thank you and there's another program that PSAC manages the the credit scholarship fund certificate of value program they just recently ran out of money that supplements the advancement grant and they've also got a forgivable loan program that they initiated for CTE that that forgivable loan program I've got quite a few people that are looking at that it's a pretty nice program for people who don't qualify for advancement or COV and they're able to access that money I just love to put a plug in for us being able to access act 77 money that that fund that you have to take a class through the Vermont state college system we were hoping that that money would be that if kid at a high school who wants to come in and get their LNA license or a welding certificate would be able to use that money through our adult programs and it turned out that we thought that we were not able to access act 77 money all right so we'd see something like that on the list that would be great okay absolutely great so we'll look forward to having work with that what Bill just said about that money okay it's good to know you guys are doing incredible work thank you so much this has been incredibly informative and I'm sorry to make you those sort of the automatic lead on this but do you mind being the collector of the info or you'll work you'll work with it mind creating a shared document with these two okay and then extend it around yeah that'd be great great thank you thanks for having us thanks Bill great to see all three of you how were you looking forward to seeing you again soon okay thanks for coming see you